The Bruise_Black Sky (13 page)

Nikolas frowned, checking out the other customers again. “What’s traditional?”

“If you’re single. You come shopping and meet others…on a Friday.”

Nikolas pondered this as they queued to pay. “This is a place to cruise for gay sex?”

Every single head in their queue and the ones on either side turned to glare at him.

Nikolas thought for a moment…Danish? Russian? Ah, English…

Ben faced front, his arms crossed stonily. It was a bad time for someone to ask for his autograph, which they did—a young man slipping forward in the queue to thrust his shopping list at Ben to have it signed. Yes, he was, yes, awesome but tragic. Nikolas had heard it too many times for it to be amusing now.

What would it be like living with the new Sushi Bar?

A Hollywood star…Ben had already been on the cover of Time. What if he was on the cover of…some Hollywood rag? Rolling Stone magazine?

Even the fucking pope had been on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine…

Maybe it would be better if Peter Cameron
was
trying to tempt Ben into a secret love affair…his replacement Oliver Stonyballs. Maybe. Ben would then obviously tell the man to poke off. He’d possibly use that exact expression, too. It was one of Ben’s favourites.
He
got it a lot.

Or would Ben fall for the superficial good looks and money of the older man? Was that like Ben? Hard to say. Peter Rabbit was married, of course—had been. Would that put Ben off? A secret affair with a handsome, ex-married, rich, older man?
Hmm
.

§§§

It was a good meal. Nikolas hadn’t eaten so much for a very long time—the lobster to start and then steak with steamed vegetables to follow. Emilia and Babushka tucked into some ice cream after, but Ben drank water and read a magazine he’d picked up at the supermarket.

Men’s Fitness.

Fuck.

He was going to have to ask.

He needed to pick his moment.

He was good at that.

Lots of practise…

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Ben was nearly at the top of the long climb in his mind. He saw it as a visceral thing, a pounding upon the tors in the sunshine, running up a steep slope, swimming in heavy waves towards a sunlit lagoon. He was almost there, Nikolas driving him from above, taking him places that no one else ever had or could, so close he could feel the tightening in his balls, the deep ache beginning to spread from—“Ben?”

—his arse to his—“Benjamin?”

“What? Fuck, Nik!”

“When are you going to tell me what’s going on?”

“What! Now?”

“So there
is
something going on?”

“Don’t fucking stop!” Ben rose forcibly to his hand and knees, thrusting back into Nikolas’s powerful body. No way would Nikolas resist this position. He wouldn’t be
able
to resist it.

They came together.

Ben could feel Nikolas filling him and then spilling out, the tickling trickle down his thigh, and he collapsed ready for sleep. A two-hour workout, no sugar—he was exhausted and fading.

“So, tell me now…”

“Oh, bloody hell. In the morning.” He could tell him and then go for a long run, give him time to get over the shock…

Nikolas lay down, heavy on Ben’s back, twirling his finger around in Ben’s hair.

“Ow!”

“Tell me.”

“Are you a little girl? Pulling hair, for fuck’s sake? The man who spoke to me at the ball is called Peter Cameron. He’s a film director. He made that movie with the psychotic marine colonel who blew up all the blue aliens that were nesting in that skyscraper in New York? That you said was the crappiest most unlikely film you’d ever seen? Anyway, Oliver Whitestone plays the guy in
After the Wars
—the one who wins all the time? Well, he died. Peter Cameron wants to make a movie about his life…a kind of documentary thing, I think, and he wants me to play Oliver. ’Cus I look a bit like him. A lot like him. And I’m not a known actor. And I kinda look…fit. There you are.”

§§§

“Uh-huh.” That scenario had not occurred to Nikolas. Ben in a one-off Peter Rabbit documentary about Oliver Cromwell. Seemed harmless enough. Even if he painted Ben blue…No, he could see no real flaws in this at the moment. “Where would it be made?”

“Two or three months in New Zealand and then in the States. Louisiana, if they can get the agreement of the studio to use the set, if not, somewhere in LA, I think.”

Even better. Two months in New Zealand. He could see this panning out very nicely. He hadn’t been to his properties in New Zealand for years…twelve? More—and then only for a fleeting visit. He could kick one of the tenants out now and they’d be gone before he got there. Very nice indeed.

Radulf?

Long way to fly a dog.

Maybe he could go first class, too…

“When do we leave?”

§§§

Ben genuinely didn’t like arguing with Nikolas. Even when he was giving Nik the silent treatment it was awful and took all his concentration not to just break down and give in—and that was when Nikolas was in the wrong.

Now, this was the first time Ben was fighting with Nikolas when
he
was in the wrong, in a way.

If their situations were reversed, there was no way on God’s earth Ben would allow Nikolas to do this on his own.
No way.
He didn’t even need to think about it. He went where Nikolas went. It’s just the way they were.

And yet, he’d now told Nikolas he was leaving him—for six months…possibly more.

They weren’t squabbling, per se. After all, what can be said after I
am
coming and no you’re
not
had been said back? Not much that didn’t just repeat endlessly until they’d bickered like children am, am not, am, am not…all fucking night, and now he had a headache and felt shaky and not like going for a long run, which is what he needed to do. He’d lost two pounds since he’d spoken to Peter Cameron, and his muscles were more prominent, especially around his waist, which is where he’d wanted to concentrate. As far as he could see, Oliver Whitestone had worn nothing except a pair of skin tight Lycra running shorts for the whole first season. You can’t get away with fat in Lycra. You just can’t.

He ate an omelette for breakfast—eight egg whites only and chatted to Emilia about her bedroom, making some more helpful suggestions than Nikolas ever would, and avoided questions about where the recalcitrant one was.

He was brooding.

That’s where he was.

Ben hated arguing with Nikolas but even worse was hurting Nikolas. He’d told him once that he would never do this. Whatever happened between them, Ben would never hurt him. This
had
hurt him.
“When do we leave?”
For how many years had he wanted Nikolas to talk about we and not I? Was it not the one thing he accused Nikolas of—that tendency to live in his own head, making his own plans and then announcing them? So wasn’t this exactly what he had just done?

Nikolas was hurting. Genuinely. All the bluff and bluster had just dissipated on genuine bewilderment and a heartfelt,
“Why can’t I come, too?”

Fucking hell.

And why couldn’t he?

Wouldn’t that be the sensible thing to do? Just find Nikolas wherever he’d taken himself off to brood and say,
“Okay, come, please.”

So why didn’t he?

If Nikolas came, everything would be done how Nikolas wanted it to be. It was just how things were. Emilia might believe that she’d bought the paint she liked. She might think she was going to paint her room how she wanted. But she wasn’t. Ben knew this. Babushka had designed a little cottage for herself and her granddaughter. Nikolas was building them a luxurious contemporary house out of oak in the grounds, which matched the architectural uniqueness of their house. He hadn’t even looked at the sketches Babushka had sent.

Nikolas had bought Babushka’s dress for the ball, Emmy’s, her necklace, hell, sent her to that school in the first place, then wanted her here for the holidays so he bought her a horse to tempt her, then had to install the grandmother or it would have been creepy…Everything, like a god playing with his little human chess pieces. Christ knows what he’d been doing in Scotland that week. Changing lives, if Ben knew Nikolas.

Everything how Nikolas wanted it to be…

Hell, Ben hadn’t even known Kate had gone to the States! He’d wondered why he never saw her at the London house anymore, why she didn’t come down. It was embarrassing what had happened, but not something they couldn’t get over. He’d not been given a chance to meet up with her. She’d just
disappeared
.

That was an unfortunate thought.

He took a cup of tea into the TV room and emailed her.

She wrote back almost instantly. Kate tended to live on her computer.

They had a brief conversation. Sorry, yes, how are you? Good.

She was still alive. That was something.

So, that’s why he didn’t go and find Nikolas and say,
“Come with me, because I love you and I’ll miss you, and you are my life.”

He didn’t do it because for one minute he’d genuinely believed Nikolas had murdered Kate and lied about her being in the States.

He’d thought this and he’d not found it ridiculous or unlikely.

That’s why he let his decision stand.

He was going on his own.

He had to.

He was
not
going to be one of the sidelined in Nikolas’s life.

He would not just
disappear
.

He
was
Nikolas Mikkelsen’s life, and he was going to continue to be so.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Emilia’s Russian school friend, Lucya, had an older sister. Suddenly, and unexpectedly, this sister had been invited by her school friend to spend the summer in the States with her. Thus, Lucya would be on her own. Lucya’s mother had phoned Ulyana Ivanovna—would Emilia come with her to Moscow for the last month of the holiday? And, of course, as she only saw her granddaughter during the hols, could they persuade Ulyana Ivanovna to accompany her…back to her own country…for a little shopping trip? Moscow? And they had a private plane.

The cottage wouldn’t be ready for them anyway, not until at least the end of September. Would Ben and Nikolas mind if they went?

Ben reflected that Ulyana Ivanovna was probably quite flattered by Nikolas’s genuine dismay that in three weeks’ time he’d be entirely on his own in the big house except for Radulf, who couldn’t see or talk to him. She hadn’t known, of course, that her abandonment coincided with
his
…It was unfortunate. There was no getting around it. Ben had been happier with the idea of going alone thinking of Nikolas with his little adoring flock to amuse him. Nikolas wasn’t too good on his own. He got into mischief. It was even worse that Tim was in Norway for some reason he had not been too specific about, and Squeezy had gone with him, for reasons no one needed explaining. That only left Jackson Keane.

Kinney was the last person Ben wanted Nikolas left with.

Although—despite the nickname Squeezy had given him—Kinney wasn’t gay, Nikolas
was
tempting.

Ben hadn’t been able to resist him.

When push came to shove (and wasn’t that an unfortunate expression when pondering Nikolas Mikkelsen?) Ben thought Kinney might go for it. Enough lines of coke and he’d probably try anything once. No, Ben had no faith whatsoever in Jackson Keane’s commitment to heterosexuality.

But he could hardly lay down rules for Nikolas whilst at the same time deserting him. They’d tried mutual rules of behaviour before, and that hadn’t worked too well for either of them. They’d been monogamous…just.

He was tempted to explain his predicament to Babushka and ask her to stay. But how did he word that? It didn’t bear thinking about.

No doubt, if he consulted Nikolas, and Nikolas was speaking to him, Nikolas would say,
“Why not ask me to come to New Zealand, Ben? That would solve all your problems.”
Because it would. It would be so easy…

Nikolas was even better at the no-speaking thing than he was, because he didn’t actually
not
say anything at all. He chatted incredibly kindly and nicely and politely, thus letting Ben know that he wasn’t being spoken to, whilst giving the impression to anyone listening that Ben was lucky to have him. He was considerate in all things, but turned his back to him in bed.

Nikolas was genuinely hurting, but there was nothing Ben could do about it.

He was a little preoccupied. It was all very well agreeing to something because you wanted to escape from your boyfriend. But then came the realisation exactly what he’d agreed to. Although everyone told Ben how good he was on the TV, he knew what he’d done—narrate a few documentaries—was vastly different to what he was going to have to do now. He was utterly dismayed by what he’d taken on. The responsibility of what he was doing terrified him.

It had been announced in the press the day before. He didn’t read the papers but even he’d seen it. It was on the six o’clock news, the BBC, the internet, and in Nikolas’s broadsheets. Oliver Whitestone’s whole life was revisited and then Ben Rider’s. Peter Cameron’s media empire had been hard at work. Ben’s new press office said only what was already known—ex-Special Forces, recruited for a charity, ANGEL, was English—no mention was made of Nikolas. Which was how Nikolas liked it, Ben knew, but still…

Peter was most insistent that Ben’s relationships with anyone not be mentioned anywhere. There had been enough speculation about Oliver’s life when he was alive. After his death, it would be…tasteless.

As far as the press was told, Peter Cameron had found his new Oliver—the same age, identical in looks and physique, both single…It was miraculous, and Peter was playing on the wave of interest.

Ben kept getting things in the post, which was always nice, except when they were stressful and daunting and he wanted to consult Nikolas about everything. Nikolas would know what it all meant…contracts, scripts, indemnities, withholding tax, insurance, travel details…Nikolas would have taken it off his hands and then presented it all to him as a done deal, sorted, and probably thrown in a few presents as well…